The Making of a Legend
by Moonlit Sunshine
Summary: S5xE11 AU. Mordred does not escape. Because I got tired of watching the story rush inevitably towards its (mostly) dark, predestined ending. Reveal fic. One-shot. Absolutely no slash.


**A/N:**

 **S5 E11-The Drawing of The Dark.**

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Mordred heard Kara's mental scream as she choked to death in the courtyard. He released an angry scream of his own and blasted his cell door off its hinges. Running down the corridor, he turned right and skid to a halt.

Merlin stood in his way.

"You," Mordred growled hatefully. Merlin didn't even blink.

"I knew you'd do this," Merlin said, his eyes deadly calm. "I can't allow you to escape, Mordred."

Mordred's eyes flashed golden. A smile split his face as Merlin sailed backwards and crashed into a wall. He dashed past him and moved towards the outermost gate, easily defeating the guards in his way.

He stopped a second time. About twenty Camelot knights stood surrounding the gate as he emerged from it. They were led by Gawaine and Percival.

"Looks like Merlin was right," Gawaine's voice held none of its usual lightness as he and Percival drew their swords.

Mordred snarled in response. His eyes flashed gold again and ten men dropped to the ground, incapacitated. Mordred drew his own sword to intercept Gawaine's when the soldiers parted to make way for their king.

Mordred's face twisted in rage as he swept more knights aside with magic and rushed straight at Arthur with his sword raised. When he was about two feet from his target, he hit an invisible barrier and fell back. He picked himself up and turned around to see Merlin come out from the prison gates.

"Mordred, stop," Merlin pleaded. "You're surrounded."

More knights around Mordred fell. Mordred swung around and charged the king again. Arthur raised his sword in defense, but Mordred's blow never struck. Arthur's eyes widened as Mordred flew backwards. Merlin was standing behind Mordred, facing Arthur, his arm outstretched and his hand in a fist, but that was not what had caught the king's attention and that of his recovering knights.

Merlin's eyes were glowing gold.

Arthur let out a cry of surprise when Merlin mouthed a spell and Excalibur flew out of his own hand. The sword turned towards Mordred, who was struggling to stand. He did not make a sound when the sword entered him. The king was dimly aware of his own knights regrouping to deal with what they perceived as a new threat. All except himself, Gawaine and Percival, who stood still in shock and disbelief.

Merlin pulled the sword out of Mordred's body and slowly approached the king with the sword in his hand, his eyes cast down. Arthur unconsciously took a step back and Merlin's eyes came up to meet his, filled with hurt at the fear and revulsion he saw in the king's eyes. His servant stopped walking and slowly knelt, holding out the sword to the king. Merlin bowed his head and Arthur's mind flashed back to the day he had first laid eyes on his servant.

 _Can you walk on your knees?_

Merlin had never knelt to him before.

"Here is Excalibur, my king," came Merlin's voice, bringing Arthur back to the present, "that I forged in a dragon's breath for you and you alone." He paused, and there was complete silence in the yard. He met the king's gaze with one filled with such earnest loyalty and determination that it made Arthur's thoughts stutter to a halt. "I give it and my complete and unconditional allegiance to The Once and Future King."

Arthur's mind was awhirl again. _Dragon's breath?_ His idiotic, bumbling manservant was a sorcerer who made magic swords and fraternized with _dragons_?

He forced himself to focus on the figure kneeling before him with such beseeching eyes that he had to turn away, something twinging oddly in his chest. He remembered a thousand laughs, secrets told and burdens shared…with someone who, as it turned out, he didn't know at all anymore. He barked out a command to his bemused knights to return to their stations, spun on his heel and strode back into the castle.

He didn't see Merlin's face crumple and his body sag in defeat behind him.

* * *

Merlin made his way to Gaius' chambers in a daze. On reaching there, he remembered that he had left Excalibur behind. He sank into a chair and buried his head in his hands. It didn't matter anymore.

Gaius came in a while later. Merlin looked up at the physician and tried to blink away his tears. The old man sat by him and put a hand on his shoulder.

"Gaius," Merlin said, with a sniff, "I wanted to say-" he paused at Gaius' disapproving look, and then went on," thank you for everything."

Gaius' disapproving look intensified and Merlin looked away. "You can't give up hope just yet, Merlin."

There was no reply. They sat in silent companionship until dawn, when the door opened and four knights entered. Merlin's heart sank. None of them were the knights closest to Arthur. Arthur would've known that Gawaine, at least, wouldn't have liked to arrest Merlin. That could only mean-

"Goodbye, Gaius," Merlin said softly. Gaius tightened his fingers on his apprentice's shoulder and then let go.

The knights led Merlin to the courtyard. There was a crowd gathered there. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Gawaine struggling to get to the front and Percival holding him back, but then he saw the man standing on the raised wooden platform and his vision tunneled.

Arthur stood there with his sword drawn. Merlin found that his knees had gone weak. The king never performed executions. Arthur had never stood on that wooden platform during an execution after he had become king. That Arthur should be so eager to chop his head off…

The guards forced Merlin onto the platform and then were dismissed. Merlin looked after them in a puzzled daze. Why hadn't they tied him up, or forced him to his knees, or something? He looked at Arthur, but the king was now addressing the crowd. The hate speech, thought Merlin despairingly.

"Citizens of Camelot," Arthur began grandly, "for years my father fought the evil that is magic in this land. Magic users have been hunted and shunned in this land. Time and time again, as a just king, I tried to show mercy and treat magic as just a tool that was misused. Time and time again, I was proved wrong."

The sickening feeling in Merlin's gut intensified. _More of this and I'll throw up,_ he thought. _Though I suppose I should be grateful for being granted the axe instead of the flames…_

Arthur was still going on about how magic users had to be mistrusted. "Therefore, our shock was great," he said solemnly, "when the man who has been our trusted manservant for years, was revealed to be sorcerer."

There were the inevitable gasps and exclamations from the crowd. Merlin saw Gawaine uselessly thrash about and elbow Percival in the gut. Gaius was not very far away. Merlin couldn't bear to meet his eyes. He suddenly saw Gwen at the edge of the crowd, next to a pillar in the courtyard instead of her usual place in th balcony. She didn't look very troubled; in fact, she seemed to be suppressing excitement. Merlin's heart twisted again. _So she, too, thinks I've betrayed Arthur._

"The man I trusted most turned out to be a sorcerer," Arthur was saying, and Merlin briefly considered casting a spell to make the ground swallow himself. _Typical, prat. You never say that to me while you think I'm loyal to you, but now-_

"Presumably, this man has carried out unimaginable acts in secret. Merlin," here Arthur turned to his startled manservant, "would you inform this interested audience of the exact details of every single instance in which you saved them?"

Merlin gaped stupidly at Arthur's stern blue eyes that did _not_ match his slightly twitching mouth. There was complete, stunned silence in the courtyard. "And," Arthur announced, "how many times you, as you once so eloquently put it, 'saved my royal hide'?"

Merlin's world turned inside out as he watched Arthur's lips curve up in a brilliant smile, before the edged of his vision began to darken.

He opened his eyes to the image of a greatly displeased monarch. "Honestly, _Mer_ lin," Arthur said, "must you faint like a frightened girl just because of an important speech? I should throw you in the stocks for this!"

Merlin crinkled his forehead and realized that the wetness on his face was Gaius sprinkling water on his face, and that he was lying on the wooden platform with Arthur looming over him menacingly, and-

"You prat!" he cried, as his memories returned.

Arthur's eyes narrowed, and Merlin only had time to squeak as he was hauled upwards by his shirt and his arm pinned behind his back. "And now," Arthur hissed in Merlin's ear, "unless you want to visit the dungeons, you will give that speech. Without fainting."

And Merlin realized he was idiotically gawping at a sea of expectant faces, with confused emotions and a very blank mind.

"Um," he began, eloquently, "Er…well." He could almost _hear_ Arthur rolling his eyes.

Then a laughing Gawaine was manhandling him, followed by Percival and Gwen, as Leon and Gaius beamed at him.

"But how?-Why…" he began again, twisting around to look at Arthur and faltering when he noticed that Arthur was still glaring.

"I…don't know what you want me to say," Merlin said, and his heart leaped when Arthur's eyes softened. "It would take too long, and I don't know where to begin, and-"

"At the beginning, idiot," Arthur said waspishly.

 _Prat._ Merlin sighed, and then started when Arthur put his arm around his shoulders. Merlin looked at Arthur in surprise, and asked hesitantly, "You're not angry?"

"Oh, I'm angry," Arthur responded offhandedly, but Merlin could tell it was faked. "Hence the executioner's block." Merlin couldn't help the involuntary shudder that ran through him. Arthur's fingers tightened on his shoulder. "I didn't mean it like that, Merlin."

"Sure you didn't."

"Gaius told me a lot, and…" Arthur faltered, his voice going rough and low.

Merlin began to smile, when the king said with a sudden, menacing smile of his own, "The stocks are waiting, as are all these people, you know."

Arthur was right about the people, Merlin saw- the crowd was chittering like so many excited sparrows at the sight of the king with his arm around the recently-convicted sorcerer, seemingly chatting relaxedly.

"Casting a glance at Gaius in a silent plea for help, Merlin began. And Camelot heard the beginnings of a legend that would live long in the minds of men.

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 **A/N:**

 **That last line was borrowed from Kilgarrah.**

 **Review, please?**


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